“They offer an initial free seminar that urges you to subscribe to their service. This service is a prohibitive $50/month. They'll release a coupon for 30% off with a 15 minute time limit to pressure you into buying. The site promises regular assistance and seminars but offers no details regarding services available, when the services will be available, and even promised events are only 2 for the coming month. A steep price for little promise.”
Hello Anon,
Thank you for your review. I am sorry that you had a negative experience at GFTB - that's absolutely not our aim, and unfortunately, as you're anonymous I can't look into your case directly, but if you wanted to reach out to our support team, I can look into it for you.
We do offer an initial free webinar, that's true - and it's always an hour's worth of excellent, and valuable content. We do offer you a discount to join our membership, but that's pretty normal practice, and indeed is a recurring discount so that your monthly or annual price remains low.
With regard to the monthly services, this is sent out via newsletter (I wonder if maybe you had unsubscribed from our email list?), but is also accessible from the dashboard. We run approximately 20-30 webinars and mentoring sessions each month, all of which can be signed up to - and there is the webinar library of approximately 2000 hours of content, as well as the 18 certified voiceover courses, the voiceover CRM, the industry standard rate guide and so much more.
But that said, I do apologise to you if you had a negative experience as this is never our intention. I do hope to see you back at GFTB one day, where I'm sure we could rectify the situation for you.
I wish you all the best
Hugh Edwards (CEO)
“A heavy sell followed by an overwhelm of emails. I had not realised I had signed up to a rolling subscription because of illness related distractions at home - and when I explained the mistake there was zero come back. Even though it was clear I had not used the service at all during this time. When you are able to unsubscribe you are offered other further subscriptions and services. Hugely regret signing up to this.”
Hi there,
Thank you for your review. I'm so sorry that you had a negative experience with us, during what was a very stressful time for everyone globally. I feel that I should however just add in a little comment or two if that's ok.
The first point is that at the point of signing up to be a member it's very clear that this is a monthly or yearly subscription service, and you are told when and how much the recurring payment will be. This is also in the email that was sent to you by way of the receipt. We do also have a 16 day money back guarantee policy if you are not happy. Because you are anonymous I'm afraid I can't look into your case directly, suffice it to say that we take pride in this policy, and stand by it because we believe in our content!
With regards the further subscriptions and services, I can explain this to you. Some of our customers are overwhelmed with the sheer volume of content we offer, and so our exit survey asks you if you can still afford the membership, and if not, if you would prefer to be on a less expensive, and more restricted plan which many people take up. Or if you have specific trouble (for example, you are having difficulty finding voiceover work) then we point you to resources that may well help you. Finally, many of our members join for a little while and leave again, and then come back later - due to GDPR rules of which we are fully compliant, we have to delete your data when you go, so we offer a data retention plan at a very low cost for those who do wish to come back in the future.
But that said, it was a difficult time, and also for us with our teams working at home during the pandemic, and it's possible that we missed your communications during that period, so either way, I apologise to you - it's never our intention to have any of our customers have a negative experience.
I do hope you might return to GFTB in the future, where hopefully we could rectify the situation.
All the best,
Hugh Edwards (CEO)
“*Update: 24/10/23 the guys at GFTB contacted me and apologised advising that they’d improved customer service. Given my experience was eventually rectified and the time that has passed, I’m happy to revise my review based on my experience of the platform, not my attempts to cancel.
I’d registered my daughter for the classes based on her love of acting and drama, hoping that she could enhance her skill set during the pandemic. She was 15 at the time and did find some of the content useful. However, given a lot of the content back then was directed at adult learners, i felt that it was too expensive to carry on.
Spent 12 hours attempting to cancel my subscription, being ignored and fobbed off and told that it was successful and then the company go right ahead and take the money from my account. Absolutely appalling customer service”
Hello Mary,
I'm so sorry that you had a bad experience at GFTB - that was never our intention. I realise that this review is somewhat late, but I wanted to feedback that we have now coded a new solution to both our customer support (which is now 24x7) and the automated cancellation process which we are rolling out to all territories.
Again, please accept my apologies, and I hope to see you back at GFTB or the One Voice Conference at some point in the future, where I'm sure we could rectify the situation with you.
All the best,
Hugh Edwards (CEO)
“After being a member for 3 months and passing the beginners section, I became lost. I then found out that to get any mentoring it would cost £119 per hour! With so many little bits you have to read or watch I then began to realise that this isn't about encouraging the next generation of voice over artists at all - this is purely about making money ...”
Hi there!
Thank you for the review. I'm sorry that you ended up having a poor experience at GFTB. We absolutely don't want that for any of our customers, and your thoughts are important to us. It seems that we could have done better with our communications with you because we do have both the mentoring forum (where you can discuss any issues you may have on a daily basis) and also the Career Planner, which maps out a path for you - all of which are integrated into the membership at no extra cost.
The other thing to mention is that we do sell one-to-one mentoring sessions additionally to the membership packages, but the group mentoring sessions (approx 8 per month) are all free to you and included as part of your membership. This kind of one-to-one mentoring is an hour long, and the prices are discounted for members - and are cheaper than the standard coaching charges you will see outside of GFTB and across the industry.
I can promise you that we do everything we can to give our members as much value for money as possible which is why we are the only voiceover training company in the world who give you all 18 voiceover courses, the 20-30 webinars & mentoring sessions per month, and the 2000 hours of webinar content in the library for that one low monthly membership fee. It's not just about making money.
That said, your opinions are important to me, and I apologise again that you didn't have a good experience with our company. I hope we might see you again in the future at GFTB so we could rectify the situation with you.
All the best,
Hugh Edwards (CEO)
Hello,
Thanks for your review. Although it's only three words, I'm sorry you had a negative experience at GFTB. It is our aim that all of our customers are satisfied, so I would be interested to know more - if you would like to reach me, please use the support widget on our site and I will reach out to you personally.
At GFTB we offer 18 certificated voiceover courses, around 20-30 monthly webinars and group mentoring sessions (with a library of over 2000 hours of content) and daily forum based mentoring, as well as a voiceover CRM, the industry standard rate-guide, checklists, an escrow service, a linkable voiceover career profile page, and much more for only $30-$45 per month. I don't think it would be unfair to say that we consider that pretty good value for money!
Anyway, I'm sorry you had a negative experience, and I wish you all the best in the future.
Hugh Edwards (CEO)
“No clarity on how to cancel. Not a good look for any company.
It would actually increase the likelihood of me coming back to them one day if they were less difficult to get away from!
Over-aggressive marketing - which signals a bit of desperation.
Impossible to get thorough on customer services tel number and my emails re cancellation are being ignored.
A pity because what they offer re training is solid, but they are spoiling their own public relations through a rather "grasping" style.
Be more cautious than I was before signing up!”
Hello Anonymous.
Thank you for your review. I'm sorry that you felt our service wasn't up to the standard you expected. We have recoded our 'leaving' process and that is being rolled out across all of our global territories, as well as a few more updates on being able to change payment methods and so on. Without your name and information, it's hard to say why you were getting so many emails as that's not our policy at all - but I suspect that it might have been because you were signed up with either multiple emails, or your email was in more than one of our databases across the world. If you'd like to get back in touch with us, I will happily look into your specific case and see what the reason was.
All the best, and thank you for having been a customer of GFTB.
Hugh. (CEO)
“I paid for membership and they quickly sent emails congratulating me on becoming a member. After a brief situation logging in, GFTB stepped in to assist and I am now enjoying the valuable content. Currently I am enjoying the sessions on how to professionally record audiobooks.
I have been in voice-over for several decades and have learned that it is impossible to know everything. It is also important to continually update skills and knowledge. GFTB is helping me dow that now.
Thank you!”
Hi James,
Thank you for your review. We investigated this and it was due to you having opted out of email marketing with us - we comply strictly with anti-spam laws. This was then resolved in your case! That said, we are looking into ways we can automate this for people who have opted out so that they don't get stuck in this loop you were in.
We are always there to support you - and if you have any further issues please don't hesitate to get in touch.
All the best,
Hugh.
“I absolutely love the platform and the service. I filled in the career planner questionnaire when I joined which gave me a roadmap of the courses I needed to focus on and which live sessions I should attend. If I couldn't make a live session it was always recorded which is great for me to fit around my family.
I was a little concerned about the issue listed below about being able to cancel but they have a big cancel button in the member's area now so I can cancel myself anytime. So that's good. From what I have read they have been around since 2008 so clearly a solid company.
I am delighted with my membership. Mentors from all over the world and a global community of other voiceovers really help when I have an issue I need to solve.
Great value for money and Highly recommend it.”
“Highly recommended. This is a one stop shop for all aspiring and established talent. Great courses, mentoring, resources and tools to run a successful voiceover business. The best bit is that it's run and personally managed by people at the top of their game and still working on the highest level projects. 5 stars. No hesitation.”
